With Saturday Night Live on hiatus, where’s a girl gonna go with her stunning impression of Marianne Williamson? Kate McKinnon, who’s previously impersonated Elizabeth Warren, flashed a bit her of brand-new Marianne Williamson impression on the Late Night with Seth Meyers live show after the second part of the Democratic presidential debate. The Daily Show with Trevor Noah and The Late Show with Stephen Colbert also held post-debate live shows to talk about the night’s big moments. Night dos (as Beto O’Rourke would say) brought out the heavy hitters Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, and Bernie Sanders, but according to the late night hosts only one of them came out unscathed.
Late Night with Seth Meyers
Seth Meyers marveled at the candidates’ willingness to straight-up roast Joe Biden. When California congressman Eric Swalwell brought up an old Biden quote to emphasize that the former vice president needed to “pass the torch,” it set the tone for the rest of the debate. “If anyone’s gonna take down Joe Biden with a Joe Biden quote, it’s Joe Biden,” Meyers joked. After the first relatively civil debate, tonight’s “food fight” seemed ridiculous for more than a few reasons. Meyers took one big issue with the screaming match, questioning “I’m sorry, you guys think you can win a scream fight with Bernie Sanders? You’re bringing a kazoo to a bullhorn fight.” And lucky for him, he didn’t even have to go after author and candidate Marianne Williamson — his guest Kate McKinnon’s impression did it for him: “My plan is to gather all the sage in America and burn it. My plan is to harness the energy of babies to finally put a man on the moon!”
The Late Show with Stephen Colbert
If it wasn’t already clear, Stephen Colbert couldn’t stop talking about Kamala Harris’s command of the debate as a whole, but also of Joe Biden specifically. “As a former prosecutor, Harris found everyone else on that stage guilty of being less interesting and sentenced them to two hours of being her pasty background singers,” he began. Joke after joke, Colbert grew increasingly fond of the California senator. “I believe in global warming because tonight Kamala Harris was on fire,” he said. And later, “I believe Harris on busing, because she clearly just took Biden to school.” Harris wasn’t the only candidate that Colbert was impressed with Thursday night. South Bend Mayor Pete pulled out a little Spanish 101 and the host’s jaw hit the floor. “I knew Buttiegieg spoke Norwegian but I had no idea he spoke Beto O’Rourke,” he gasped.
The Daily Show with Trevor Noah
McKinnon isn’t the only one with a Williamson impression up her sleeve. “We don’t need a plan my friends, just give me one vial of CBD oil and our chakras will be aligned,” Trevor Noah said while attempting Williamson’s voice. But in contrast to her high, slow voice, there was Bernie Sanders, who always sounds like you stepped in his garden. Noah also declared him the winner of the screaming match, and did his own little Bernie impression: “That’s right! And just wait until I turn on my mic.” But no matter how much yelling he did, Kamala Harris still took control of the night, according to Noah, by “busing Biden out of the debate” and pulling out her big guns when Marianne Williamson brought up race. “That was the right time to use the race card,” Noah agreed. “And by the way for those asking, the race card is a real card.”
